Guardian of the Source
The Guardian of the Source is the main antagonist of the film Highlander: The Source. Biography Little is known of his life before taking on the title, other than the fact that was a world-renowned assassin, and presumably met a violent death at some point, which activated his immortality. He subsequently teamed up with a band of fellow Immortals, who took on a quest to find the Source, their supposed "Holy Grail" which occurred only once every few thousand years. During the journey the group gradually turned on and killed each other (in part due to the Source temporarily turning all nearby Immortals back into ordinary humans), leaving only himself and two other Immortals, one male and one female. Upon arriving at the Source's manifestation, the group met with its Guardian, who engaged the two men in combat. Unbeknownst to the Immortals, the test of the Source was to immobilize and then spare the Guardian, rather than kill him. As a result, when they decapitated him, the Immortal who dealt the killing blow was transformed into the new Guardian, the other male was left grotesquely deformed, and the female was absorbed into the Source, to be reincarnated as the non-Immortal woman Anna Teshemka thousands of years later. Shortly before the Source was due to manifest itself again, the Guardian began hunting down those who intended to seek it out, so as to dispose of anyone likely to pass the Source's test (which would prolong the Guardian's tortured existence). He killed Zai Jie, an Immortal archaeologist, and then fought against Duncan MacLeod. Identifying MacLeod as a suitable candidate to take his life, the Guardian began killing Duncan's friends, starting with longtime ally Joe Dawson, later followed by Reggie Weller, an Immortal computer expert hired to help Duncan and his allies on their quest, and then another of Duncan's allies, Cardinal Giovanni (though Giovanni had gone crazy and abandoned Duncan by that point). He then abducted Anna, who also happened to be Duncan's former wife, and brought her to where the Source was manifesting. Upon his arrival at the site of the Source, Duncan attacked the Guardian, and the two engaged in fierce combat. Eventually, Duncan succeeded in immobilizing the Guardian, by tricking him into spinning around so fast that he drilled himself into the ground. The Guardian then taunted Duncan and demanded that he be decapitated as a fallen foe, but Duncan, disillusioned by the death of his allies (and possibly realizing that the Guardian was trying to fool him into being transformed into the next Guardian), refused to do so. The Guardian then glowed brightly and appeared to explode, screaming that he was "cursed forever" (or at least until the next manifestation of the Source, which would not be for several more millennia). Abilities Unlike the other Immortals seen in the Highlander franchise, the Guardian was truly immortal and completely invulnerable to any form of damage. The only way to kill him was by decapitating him at the site where the Source was manifesting itself, as he himself did to his predecessor as Guardian. In addition, he had the ability to move around at speeds far in excess of any other human or Immortal. The Guardian was also an expert swordfighter even before he became the Guardian, which is likely the reason why he was one of only three Immortals (from what was originally a much larger party) to reach the Source in the first place. Personality The Guardian was cruel and merciless, but also tended to behave in a very goofy manner. Of note, upon his first encounter with Duncan MacLeod he put on a cod Scottish accent and mocked Duncan before the two fought. Later on, when making an attempt on the life of Reggie Weller (though it actually ended with Joe Dawson being killed), he ran around a graveyard singing the Queen song "Who Wants to Live Forever?" Notes * The Guardian's motivations are only loosely hinted at in the film's U.S. release cut. An earlier cut released in Russia and several Asian countries makes his motivations clearer, when he rants at Duncan after being defeated. * The U.S. cut also greatly tones down the Guardian's behavior; in particular, the earlier cut gave him a habit of impersonating his victims in various silly voices before attacking them, which in the U.S. cut is reduced to him simply impersonating Duncan's accent before they fight for the first time. Category:Male Category:Science Fiction Villains Category:Mischievous Category:Immortals Category:Suicidal Category:Murderer Category:Sadists Category:Assassins Category:Live Action Villains Category:Psychopath Category:Guardians Category:Fallen Heroes Category:Extravagant Category:Imprisoned Category:Evil from the Past Category:Stalkers Category:Neutral Evil Category:Psychological Abusers Category:One-Man Army Category:Dark Knights